Yes, I am drinking a Surge soda right now as I type this. That may not be big news to some of you, but in our family – and specifically to two of my sons – it is a huge thing. Surge soda and its disappearance is sort of like the original Coca-Cola, only on a smaller scale. Surge was created by Coca-Cola in 1996 to compete with Pepsi’s Mountain Dew. But since we all know that Mt. Dew is the best soft drink ever, Coca-Cola realized that it wasn’t possible for it to win out over Mt. Dew and they chose to discontinue Surge in 2003. Many faithfuls – including my 2nd son who was 14 at the time – begged for it to come back. Coca-Cola tried Vault soda as a replacement and it was closer to Mt. Dew, but still not enough competition and it eventually disappeared as well.
With that disappearance, Coca-Cola tried harder to push Mello Yello and it’s doing ok, but still isn't great competition for Mt. Dew’s dominance in that corner of the soft drink market (I like to call it the yellow soda market). In this scenario, Vault = New Coke and now we have Surge being re-released by Coca-Cola in periodic limited quantities exclusively through Amazon which likens it to the re-release of the original Coca-Cola (called Coca-Cola Classic or Coke Classic for awhile). My 3rd son – who is now 23 – just bought some off of Amazon and while it is still not going to replace my Mt. Dew, it is fun and nostalgic to be drinking it right this minute. The interesting thing is it keeps selling out very quickly on Amazon at about $6 per 12 pack (in new, larger 16 oz. can sizes) and then re-emerging for about $100 per 12 pack being sold by individuals who are purchasing it and then immediately reselling it for big profits.
Smart marketing or soothing the squeaking minority?
Why am I telling you this? Because it’s good marketing…or lucky marketing. But most people think Coca-Cola knew what they were doing when they created such an uproar over changing from Coca-Cola to New Coke and then re-introducing Coca-Cola Classic. And they know there’s a market for Surge again. With this re-release in periodic limited quantities through Amazon only, they are creating an even bigger market for it right now. Smart moves all around.
What does this mean to creative teams and project managers? Strategy, strategy, strategy. Most creative teams don’t really need to be told this. But some do. No matter what you’re doing, when you change a product or discontinue a product, you may be making 80% of the users or consumers happy…but you may be really upsetting the other 20%. Have a strategy…have something to offer them. In the case of Coca-Cola, their original change was probably the other way around in terms of response…80% unhappy and 20% happy. And they fixed it fairly quickly. But they also gained a lot of publicity out of it. With Surge, it affected a much smaller niche of individuals, but people created websites and petitions calling for it to come back and that at least forced Coca-Cola to respond with a replacement beverage. So at least they were heard.
Summary
Where am I going with this? Much like the handy man is supposed to measure twice and cut once, think about what effect your design, change, or marketing action is going to have not only on the masses, but also on those smaller groups of die-hards whose devotion may not make sense. But they can make noise. Don’t forget about them.
What about our readers? Have you had projects, or marketing campaigns or new product releases (or product restructuring and changes) that worked, but really caused an issue with a portion of your clientele or user base? What did it do to your market share? How did you respond? And, now, in the world of social media and real-time response and trending…what would happen if Coca-Cola pulled their world famous recipe out from under the masses and replaced it? It would be 10 times more painful. Maybe 1000 times more painful. What would their response be now? Our margin for error and timeframe for recovery is growing much, much smaller.
